


discography

by malamanteau



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, so what if Obito lived, yeah wow real creative I know THAT one's never been done before
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-12
Updated: 2018-08-29
Packaged: 2018-09-23 18:04:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 16,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9670058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/malamanteau/pseuds/malamanteau
Summary: Obito survives.Things happen after that.





	1. before and after

**Author's Note:**

> I wasn't going to write this fic, but I'd been sitting on the idea for a week, and I had many delicious bourbon-based cocktails this evening.
> 
> Theoretically there'll be 19 (fairly short) chapters of this. Rating will most likely be upped as we go.

Kakashi has had to rebuild himself many, many times over. He’s never quite gotten used to it. You would think, he muses wryly, that a man like him would either have figured out a foolproof method by now, or would have learned his lesson and stopped trying altogether.

But he has done neither of those things, and here he is, shattered once more, only a day or so (how long has it been? Time has long since lost all meaning here, at what they all thought was the end of the world) removed from the loss of his very last, unshakeable foundation.

Obito was pure, a perfect sacrifice, unimpeachable in Kakashi’s memory. He was the epitome of everything Kakashi worked for, everything he strove to emulate. Courageous, fiercely loyal, so selfless as to lay down his own life to save a teammate: there could be no fault in Obito, and whenever Kakashi found himself in the depths of hopelessness and despair, he had turned to the spotless, gleaming image of Obito he held in his mind, and pulled himself back out into the light again.

And yet yesterday (the day before yesterday? A month, a year, a lifetime ago?) he had stared, petrified with horror, at a too-familiar face ravaged by scars and cruelty. He had listened, with utter dread, as Obito’s voice, deepened by time and raspy with long-simmering hatred, had laid out his twisted plans to bring existence as they knew it to a close.

Kakashi had not thought he could be broken again so completely; not after all he’d endured. Yet the revelation that his bright shining light was the epicenter of all their misfortune had been enough to literally bring him, shaking, to his knees.

And now -

now, somehow, against all odds, the war is over, the last and greatest enemy of all defeated, and Obito, having clawed his way into some kind of redemption at the end of it all, lies half-conscious and more than half-dead at his feet.

“He shouldn’t be alive,” Sakura says, straightening from where she’s had her fingertips pressed to Obito’s temples. “Kaguya’s Ash Bones - as far as I can tell, nothing’s supposed to be able to survive those.”

She glances meaningfully at Naruto, who still has an impossible sun burning in the center of his palm. He shrugs, and there is a world of weariness in the gesture. Kakashi realizes, suddenly, that this war has aged all of them, but perhaps none more so than Naruto. It - aches.

“I don’t know how this works,” says Naruto, and he sways on his feet a little. “Even with the old man’s power, it took everything I had to keep him from dying.”

“Sit down, dobe, before you pass out and make even more of a fool of yourself.” Sasuke is watching the scene with crossed arms and a carefully unimpressed expression, but Kakashi knows better; he can practically see the gears turning behind those obsidian eyes.

Naruto instantly flushes a furious red, puffing up like an enraged pigeon, but before he can so much as open his mouth, Obito moans and stirs. Multiple pairs of eyes instantly snap to his face, no one daring to so much as breathe. Here in the massive crater that once held the God Tree, the silence is deafening.

“Rin?” Obito murmurs, lips cracked and bleeding, and it should be impossible, but Kakashi can _feel_ his heart breaking just that little bit more.

“Not just yet,” he manages, and is startled by the tremor in his own voice.

There are, he realizes, ten thousand things he wants to say to this man, things he’s kept hidden away inside for two decades, things borne out of the incomprehensible whirlwind of the past 36 hours, things that Kakashi himself doesn’t understand. He finds, with little surprise, that all of them are lodged unshakeable in his throat.

Maybe it’s too late for them now. Maybe there is no redemption left in this world for people like the two of them any longer.

But Obito slowly opens his eyes - both his eyes, a perfectly matched pair of Sharingan black-and-red - and looks right at Kakashi, looks straight into the core of him, and if he didn’t know it wasn’t possible Kakashi would swear that Obito _sees_.

“She.... wouldn't mind if I stayed a little longer,” says Obito after a pause that seems to last an eternity, and Kakashi may be a broken man, but at those words something inside his chest unfurls and stretches cautious tendrils towards the sun, and he sucks in a shivery breath.

They are surrounded by the mightiest powers in the Five Great Countries, living and dead, by a figure straight out of legend and the two boys he chose to save the world, but Kakashi doesn’t care.

He sinks to his knees beside Obito. He reaches out with shaking fingers. He takes his hand.


	2. fly by night

“You’re thinking of leaving,” Kakashi says, and it isn’t a question.

Obito debates the merits of pretending to be asleep, but he knows full well (better, perhaps, than most) that Kakashi earned his reputation and rank for a reason. He lies still a moment longer, then sighs and turns on the narrow camp cot, wincing at the movement, till he can just barely see Kakashi’s face in the dim moonlight, or what little of it there is to see. 

“Yes,” he replies, quietly.

He’s not sure what kind of reaction he’s expecting from Kakashi: anger, grief, confusion. He isn’t prepared for the thoughtful, steady gaze Kakashi gives him from his perch on a folding stool in the corner.

“Pulling a Sasuke,” Kakashi says after a moment.

“Excuse me?”

Kakashi’s right eye crinkles, just a little; even after his original left eye was restored by Naruto, he’s been keeping it covered, and Obito hasn’t yet figured out whether it’s force of habit or because his hitae-ate keeps slipping down his face. Either possibility is sufficiently amusing that he hasn’t bothered to ask. “Sasuke wants to do the same.”

Obito can barely resist the urge to roll his eyes. Of course he does. Some sort of noble idea of atonement, probably. Sasuke’s ideas have always nearly rivaled his own in their grandiose delusion. Perhaps, Obito thinks with black humor, it’s an Uchiha thing.  

“But you have different reasons,” Kakashi continues, interrupting his thoughts. Again, not a question, and Obito blinks, taken aback by the insight.

“Yes,” he agrees, pushing himself painfully into a sitting position, just making out the faint rustle as the approximately 20 ANBU stationed invisibly in and around his tent shift into wary readiness. Kakashi hears it too, if the slight tightening of his expression is any indication, but otherwise doesn’t react. 

Obito can’t blame them, really. To be perfectly honest, it’s a miracle the Five Kage have even let him live this long. Sasuke is considered a dangerous criminal in his own right, and Obito knows the discussions swirling around his fate are intense and fraught — but he is nothing compared to Obito, the magnitude of his crimes a guttering candle to Obito’s inferno. He was frankly surprised when he wasn’t executed on the spot the instant he regained consciousness.

He suspects, faintly, that Kakashi had something to do with it.

That, and the seals Minato placed upon his wrists just before he returned to the afterlife. “Let me do this,” he had said, eyes intent and earnest on Obito’s face as he reached for brush and ink, and what could Obito possibly say to that, to this man whose blood had stained his hands his entire adult life?

He had held out his wrists like an offering, and bowed his head, and bit his lip to keep from crying out when the completed seals burned their way into his flesh, dampening his chakra instantly, draining the Sharingan from his eyes. 

It was, after all, the least, the very least of what he deserved.

They are works of art, the seals, Obito thinks, turning his hands to and fro in the moonlight. Minato’s seals always were seemingly light and delicate things, beautiful in their elegant simplicity, yet thrumming with power. Obito knows full well that he could spend a lifetime working away at these seals and not remove their influence.

And yet -

“These don’t have to be permanent,” Minato had murmured in his ear, crouching beside him in the dust. “Everyone has the capacity for change.”

Minato had always had far too much faith in him, hadn’t he? But Obito can’t bring himself to argue.

_Everyone has the capacity for change._

“I don’t know who I am anymore,” he admits, studying the twisting lines of the seals. “I had one singular purpose for twenty years, and it’s been taken from me.”

He looks up, meets Kakashi’s unblinking eye. “If I’m going to continue to exist in this world,” _this cold and unforgiving world with all its flaws, all its faults and broken edges, this world I nearly brought to an end without batting an eye,_ “I need to find myself again.”

It sounds horribly clichéd, but Obito can’t think of a better way to say it. There is a yawning void at the core of him, a gaping hole where his vision of a perfect world used to reside, and in its place is — what?

He doesn’t know yet; he isn’t sure he _can_ know. But there’s only one way to find out.

And — and, Obito thinks, it’s time he decided his own fate for once.

Kakashi searches his face and nods like he’s decided something. “I think it’s a good idea.” He shifts position on the stool, long legs stretching out in front of him, and Obito knows it’s intentional, a purposeful relaxation that conveys to the watching ANBU that Kakashi doesn’t see him as a threat. “I don’t know that they’ll be happy about it, but I’ll do what I can to convince them it’s reasonable.”

He says it with enough confidence that Obito narrows his eyes a little at him, until realization hits like a thunderclap. “They’re going to make you Hokage.”

Kakashi tips one shoulder. “Tsunade’s been wanting to retire since the minute she took the hat.” 

“But Naruto’s still too young,” Obito surmises, and leans back, crossing his arms. “So you’re the compromise.”

Kakashi huffs quietly, mock-offended, but doesn't disagree. He glances at Obito sidelong, and it takes him a moment to realize why. 

Being Hokage was _his_ dream, after all. 

“You think I’m going to resent you for that?” Obito asks. “After all this?” He waves his hand in the air expansively, indicating himself, Kakashi, the scorched wasteland their tent sits on.

Kakashi doesn’t answer, gaze dropping, and Obito sees the _yes_ written in the hunch of his shoulders, in the way his fingers lace tightly together.

“Kakashi,” he says, and doesn’t say anything more until Kakashi reluctantly meets his eyes again. “I gave up the rights to that dream a long time ago.”

“You wanted this,” says Kakashi, quietly. “I never did.”

“Ah, but you’ll be better at it than I could ever have been.” Obito resettles himself on the cot; sitting in any one position for too long makes his bones ache. “Besides, you’re one of the great heroes of this war. You’ll have the goodwill of all the hidden villages behind you.”

He says it without an ounce of bitterness. What would be the point, when Obito never, ever expected to live this long, never imagined a world where his grand and terrible dream didn’t succeed and yet he survived?

Kakashi shakes his head a little, eye settling on the far wall of the tent, staring at nothing. “After this? Maybe not.”

By _this_ he means _you,_ Obito knows, and hears the truth in it. 

“Do you regret it?” he asks.  

Kakashi says nothing for a long moment. When he turns to look at Obito head-on, Obito is staggered by the depth of emotion in that lone grey eye.

“Obito,” Kakashi begins, and his voice is just barely unsteady. “My life is made of regrets.”

He pauses, swallowing. Obito waits with his breath caught in his throat.

“But not this,” says Kakashi, and Obito couldn’t look away from his face if he tried. “Never this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> how does formatting work? we just don't know


	3. i think i'm going bald

Kakashi is tired.

That’s not new; the existence of a shinobi isn’t exactly conducive to a regular sleep schedule, or a relaxing week off. But this is different from the necessary exhaustion that’s made up the background radiation of his life since he was six years old. Kakashi is _weary;_ his bones ache when he gets out of bed on cold winter mornings, now, and he can only run so many laps around the outer wall of the village (trailed by ANBU at all times, of course, despite his protests) before his knees begin to creak and his breaths come shorter. 

He supposes it has something to do with turning forty. 

Kakashi knows, despite Naruto’s over-loud insistences to the contrary, that he’s getting old. It’s not like silver hair can turn grey, not really, but he sees new wrinkles in the mirror every time he turns around, and it’s gotten harder and harder to read the fine print on the piles of paperwork sitting on his desk every morning.

It’s the price he pays for being good at his job, he thinks half-humorously one morning, snorting quietly into his cup of tea as the sun streams through his window and spills across the kitchen table. Shinobi aren’t really expected to make it past thirty — although, in the unusually long calm that’s followed the end of the last war, that might be changing. 

Kakashi sips his tea reflectively. For all that he quietly resents his slowly failing body, for all that his position as Hokage has worn on him these past eight years in ways both big and small, he is acutely aware that he may well be part of the most fortunate generation of Kage in history. They laid everything on the line for a peace unlike anything their world has ever known, and so far, all of them seem steadfastly determined to keep it. It’s not just that there hasn’t been another war on Kakashi’s watch; it’s that where the four other main hidden villages are concerned, there haven’t even been minor skirmishes. Oh, certainly, there are still threats out there, but Kakashi knows that if enemies come to Konoha’s door, he has the full weight of five nations on his side to help take them down.

Even so, he’s counting the days till retirement at this point.

Kakashi wonders, absentmindedly, as he does every morning, how Obito is doing.

He gets letters, now and then. Even at forty, Obito’s handwriting has never evolved beyond a hasty adolescent scrawl that Kakashi has to squint to read. But it’s worth the trouble, because over time Obito’s letters have progressed from terse, uncertain affairs into multiple-page missives vivid with detail and surprisingly humor-laden, achingly similar to the Obito Kakashi remembers from his youth. Reading his writing, Kakashi can almost hear Obito’s voice in his ear, can almost see the great wide world through his eyes. 

Last he heard, Obito had stumbled across a small civilian fishing village ( _you wouldn’t believe the smell sometimes, Kakashi, but the stew is_ so good), the kind of place where people had never heard of Akatsuki, or Madara, and were grateful for a quiet, hard-working itinerant shinobi to earn his keep helping with the catch or scaring away thieves. Kakashi can imagine Obito planting his feet with the aid of chakra and helping to drag great nets out of the sea, the skin on his cheekbones and shoulders freckling and peeling in the hot summer sun. He has no idea if it’s an accurate mental image or not, but picturing it brings a small smile to his face.

The one thing Obito never talks about in his letters is when, or if, he’s returning. Kakashi has long since learned to accept this, understands the reasons behind it, but it still aches like a kunai to the gut every time he remembers that, shinobi life being what it is, there is a very real chance they’ll never see each other again. It’s tempting, so tempting, to leave it all behind, to just pack up right now and give the hat to Naruto, and travel the world till he finds Obito again, just to look on his (impossible, should have died decades ago) face once more after all this time.

But, of course, he will do no such thing. Kakashi has always understood painfully well what duty is.

He sighs heavily, stirs his cooling tea; thinks of that first piercing moment of eye contact just after the war ended, and wonders: if Obito looked at him like that now, eight years later, what would he see?

So wrapped up in his thoughts is he, that he almost misses the faint spike of alarm from the resident ANBU on his front porch, and the knock on his door that comes only after a long, weighty pause.

Brow furrowing, Kakashi pushes his mug away, tugs his mask back into place, and stands, grimacing at the popping of near-arthritic joints. He pads to the door on slippered feet, stifles a yawn before wrapping his fingers around the knob. Pulls the door open.

It takes him a moment to process what — who — he is seeing.

And then, as he sags against the doorframe (not hearing at all the ANBU’s startled exclamation), all he can really register through the shock is that Obito has _laugh lines_ around his eyes.


	4. tears

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, wow, this took me a while. I had a busy week at work, and then a friend unexpectedly needed surgery yesterday, so I've spent most of my waking hours since getting out of work yesterday hanging out in the hospital, which isn't exactly a great environment for cranking some writing out. Admittedly, I work in a hospital, so you'd think I'd be used to all these beeping noises by now, but it's different somehow when it's someone you know. 
> 
> (He's going to be fine, by the way.)
> 
> Anyway, now that I've dumped my entire personal life on you, here's the next chapter! It's a short one, of perhaps uncertain quality, given the weirdness of these past few days. I'm off Monday so hopefully I can get at least one more up before work resumes.

The first real thought Obito has about Kakashi’s house is that it feels like a _home._ The second is a vague sense of shame that that surprises him.

He looks around the living room curiously. Kakashi’s never been an extravagant man, as far as Obito knows, and his decor and furnishings would certainly be considered minimalistic by most. But here and there are personal touches that Obito can only guess at the meaning behind: a wooden sculpture on the coffee table so artfully done that it almost looks as though it was grown; a framed drawing of Konoha on the wall, clearly inked by an extraordinarily skilled hand; an obviously old and well-loved multicolored quilt draped across the back of the sofa. Obito’s eyes light on an outrageously colorful and misshapen mug on the kitchen table that says “CONGRATULATIONS HOKAGE” in what he vaguely recognizes as Naruto’s handwriting, then drift to the dog-eared collection of Icha Icha novels on the low bookshelf by the window. He snorts. Typical Kakashi, or at least typical adult Kakashi. The younger version would probably be aghast.

“Nice place,” he offers at length, when the silence begins to grow uncomfortable. Kakashi hasn’t said a word since he arrived.

Still nothing, and Obito turns, prepared to pull a witty remark out of his ass or die trying. Anything he might have said, though, dies on his lips when he gets a good look at Kakashi’s face.

Kakashi is crying. He is staring at Obito, eyes wide, still as a statue, and he is _crying,_ tears running silently down his cheeks and soaking into his mask.

Obito has no idea what he was expecting, but it certainly wasn’t this. In all his memories of Kakashi since the cave — in righteous anger, in shocked grief, in uncertainty and contemplation — he hasn’t seen him cry since the moments immediately after the rocks came down. 

Back then, he’d offered up whatever comfort he could: reassurances, lies (because feeling no pain was a lie, oh yes. Obito had wanted nothing more, with a boulder crushing half his body, than to scream his throat raw), empty platitudes. None of it mattered, did it? He was dying.

But now — now Obito walks a still-unfamiliar path through the land of the living; his words will have consequences, here, in this place. And so he looks at Kakashi, weeping without a sound, and can’t begin to imagine what to say.

“…. Kakashi?” he manages, finally, cracking voice catching him by surprise.

Another frozen moment passes, then two, and then Kakashi blinks. He takes a deep breath, eyes refocusing, and offers Obito one of his trademark crinkle-eyed fake smiles. “You _do_ have freckles.”

Obito is a) utterly nonplussed and b) not buying it. “You’re crying because of my freckles.”

Kakashi scrubs the sleeve of his yukata across his eyes. When he drops his arm, the fake smile is gone, too, and in its place is a look so unexpectedly and devastatingly soft that Obito’s breath catches.

“You look… happy,” he says quietly. “I’d forgotten what it was like.”

Oh, and if _that_ doesn’t hit Obito like a gut punch.

It’s true, though, isn’t it? Before the end of the war, the closest he’d come to happiness in two decades was a sort of cold satisfaction at plans well laid and pieces falling into place. But now… now there’s something like peace where the hole in Obito’s heart used to be. Something he can live with.

And the fact remains that when eight years had passed and his mind told him to go _home,_ Obito’s feet led him to Kakashi’s door, and he thinks he might be able to live with that, as well.

He smirks at Kakashi, needing a way to defuse the sudden lump in his throat. “Never took you for a softie, old man.”

“Watch who you’re calling old,” Kakashi retorts lazily, automatic as breathing. “Unless you’re going to pretend you’ve always had those wrinkles.”

“Hey!” Obito protests. “I heard your joints pop when you turned around, asshole.”

“Maa, maa…”

Obito barely pays attention to whatever Kakashi says next, too fixated on those soft eyes that haven’t once left his own.

_You look happy._

_Only because you gave me the chance to be,_ Obito thinks, and smiles.


	5. closer to the heart

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, y'all. I did not mean for this to take nearly as long as it did. Life has a funny habit of tripping you up just as you feel like you're hitting your stride, doesn't it? 
> 
> But here it is at last - chapter 5. And hopefully more to come, this week or early next, if I play my cards right. Thanks for sticking with me; I'll do the best I can to make it worth the wait.

“I... heard you have a guest, Hokage-sama.”

Kakashi puts down the shipping manifest he’s been halfheartedly skimming and meets Sai’s steady, unreadable gaze across his desk.

A guest. 

Yes, he supposes Obito is that. 

(But that doesn’t capture how Kakashi lost the ability to breathe this morning when he made his way into the kitchen and saw Obito at the sink, humming quietly to himself as he washed last night’s dishes. It doesn’t encompass the way his chest tightened, the way his feet might as well have grown roots in the floor for all he was able to move. 

“I haven’t started drying them yet,” Obito had said without turning around, buffing a dripping plate with a sponge, and Kakashi had struggled mightily to resist the urge to pinch himself awake from what seemed an impossible dream.

He had at last managed to remember how to walk, how to breathe, how to take a place by Obito’s side with dishtowel in hand and carefully wipe dry the plates and bowls. How to keep his hands from trembling. How to stand just close enough to feel the warmth of Obito’s skin in the inches of air between them, and say nothing at all despite the ache in his throat.

And, Kakashi realizes with a sinking feeling, there’s no way he can explain any of that to his ANBU commander, watching him with an ever-so-slight furrow in his brow.)

“Yes,” he says, after a pause he already knows was just a shade too stretched. “A guest.”

The furrow deepens. Sai lets out a breath that’s a little longer than the ones preceding it.

“Hokage-sama,” he says carefully. “I understand that you and Uchiha Obito share an… unusual bond. But this…” he trails off, looking suddenly uncertain.

Kakashi can guess what’s coming; can understand why Sai drops his gaze, why the ANBU in the corner is nearly vibrating with tension.

“It’s not exactly in line with… expectations,” he guesses, and feels grim satisfaction at being right when Sai’s shoulders (just barely perceptibly) sag with relief.

“I knew you would understand, Hokage-sama,” the ANBU commander replies, leaning forward. “You know, and I know, and a few more people know, that Uchiha Obito had more than a small part in saving the world. But to many, many more people… he’s a traitor, still; he’s the reason the war started in the first place, and the cause of many more misfortunes besides.” 

Sai had looked away for a moment as he said this; now he meets Kakashi’s eyes straight on, intent. “You can see how a situation like this involving the Hokage could be — misconstrued, if word gets out.”

Yes, Kakashi can see that. There is a storm brewing on the horizon, and Obito is at its center. 

How cruelly familiar. 

He thinks of scores of villagers dead, and scores more in mourning. Thinks of Konoha leveled, reduced to a crater of ash. Thinks of countless Alliance shinobi flinging themselves towards certain annihilation at the hands of the man who scrubbed plates in his kitchen this morning.

(Thinks of Minato and Kushina, and grieves.)

But —

Obito, in the end and against all odds, somehow pulled himself out of the deepest, darkest pit of agony and hate that Kakashi has ever seen, and has been steadily working to redeem himself ever since, all the while burdened with the knowledge that there are some things that can never really be fixed. The seals on his wrists are proof enough of that, a stark black reminder against his skin that Kakashi hadn’t been able to look away from as Obito handed him platters and mugs to dry. 

To throw him to the wolves now — well, Kakashi really can’t bring himself to imagine it. 

_Enough suffering,_ he thinks. _Enough._

He’s tired. So, so tired. He’s been Hokage for eight years, felt the weight of responsibility on his shoulders day in and day out as surely as though the flame-edged haori he wore were made of lead, and now he is being asked to abandon the only person who’s been able to lift that weight in more time than Kakashi cares to measure.

It’s simply not possible, he realizes, and the certainty behind the thought is startling.

Well. It had to happen sometime, didn’t it?

Kakashi drags himself out of his thoughts with an effort and makes himself look at Sai, who is watching him carefully. “You know, I’ve been thinking.”

“About what, Hokage-sama?” Sai is wary. 

He has every right to be, considering. Kakashi takes a deep breath, lets it out, and musters up the sunniest, most crinkle-eyed smile he can manage.

“Well," he says before his courage can fail him, "it’s about time I stepped gracefully into retirement, don’t you think?”


	6. circumstances

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some of you in the comments have been waiting for the inevitable emotional train wreck.
> 
> All I have to say, my friends, is that we have arrived.

To say that a lot has changed over the course of Obito’s life would be putting it mildly.

It would be almost impressive if it weren’t so depressing: boy spends his childhood as the black sheep of the clan, unable to do anything right; boy is left on the brink of death thanks to a hearty helping of self-sacrifice just as he starts to uncover his potential; boy is saved (in only the loosest sense of the word, really) and grows into a man who becomes the world’s greatest fear made flesh, only to lose it all right at the end and spend the rest of his life trying futilely to pick up the pieces.

Quite frankly, it’s ridiculous. But it’s what Obito has to go on, and he’s been making the best of it, despite the fact that he’s spent a good portion of his life not really recognizing the person who stares back at him out of the mirror in the mornings.

The one unwavering constant in his life has been that there’s no one on earth who gets under his skin quite the way that Kakashi does.

(Of course, Obito thinks bleakly, desperately; didn’t someone once say that the more things change, the more they stay the same?)

“I can’t _believe_ you,” he hisses.

Kakashi is stiff and ramrod straight, every inch of him bespeaking barely-contained tension, in stark contrast to his utterly relaxed posture as he strolled through the door a few minutes before. “Excuse me?”

Obito laughs incredulously. “Oh, don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about.” He advances on Kakashi slowly but surely, as though he were hunting down a wounded animal, and is gratified at the way Kakashi somehow shrinks back without ever moving at all.

“Do you really expect me to believe,” he continues, smiling with all teeth and not an ounce of humor, “that your ‘retirement’ a day after I show up on your doorstep is a _coincidence?_ ”

“I don’t expect you to believe that,” Kakashi says, and his voice has taken on a chill. “I never said it was a coincidence.”

Oh, that's even worse. Obito can feel his hands clenching into fists. He knows damn well what Kakashi must have heard from his ANBU, why he’s doing what he’s doing. The fact that Kakashi’s not even going to pretend innocence is too much to take.

Self-restraint is overrated, Obito thinks, and lets go.

“Classic Kakashi,” he taunts, taking the bubbling pool of anger rising inside of him and projecting it outward in a way that’s disgustingly, deliciously familiar. “Ever the martyr, aren’t you? Ever the sacrificial offering. Poor, noble Kakashi, always so eager to take the fall when no one else will. Aren’t you just so fucking _perfect._ ” He nearly snarls the last, and is close enough to Kakashi now to see the vein jump in his temple, the way his jaw clenches and his eyes narrow dangerously.

To be honest, Obito had started to forget what it was like to be on the wrong side of a very, very pissed-off Kakashi. In a dizzying, sickening way, it’s almost refreshing, a 180-degree reversal from the unimaginable tranquility of the morning spent doing dishes side-by-side.

_But you liked doing the dishes,_ a small voice points out, and Obito crushes it mercilessly. Now is absolutely not the time.

( _Why are you so angry about this?_ another, even smaller voice asks, and that one Obito refuses to even acknowledge, because that’s a road he really does not want to go down. Not now.)

“Did it ever occur to you,” Kakashi says through clenched teeth, “that maybe this isn’t all about you? Did it ever once cross your mind, Obito, that you’re not the center of the universe?”

That’s it, Kakashi, Obito thinks viciously. Just like that. Sink to my level; I know you’ve got it in you.

“Why the hell else would you have done it?” he demands, on the verge of shouting now. “What other possible reason could you have to just — up and leave your job as the goddamn _Hokage_ without any advance notice?”

“Maybe,” Kakashi snaps, looking like he could burn a hole in the wall with his glare, “I’ve been wanting to do this for a long time, and you just gave me a good excuse!”

“I shouldn’t be anyone’s excuse for _anything!_ ” Obito flings his arms wide. “I shouldn’t even be _alive!_ Much less any of the shit that’s happened since! There is nothing — _nothing_ — about this that I deserve. Do you understand that? Do you understand these?” He thrusts his wrists into Kakashi’s face just to see him flinch. “Have you forgotten what these mean? Have you forgotten what I’ve _done?_ I don’t deserve any of this, Kakashi. Not my life — not this, this stupid _domesticity_ thing you seem to think we’ve got going — and certainly not your… your _pity._ ”

He’s nearly run out of air by the time he finishes. Kakashi’s eyes have gone very wide. For a long, suspended moment, there is silence.

Then Kakashi closes in on himself, drawing back, shuttering his gaze, forcing himself into eerie composure. It’s as though the life has been leached out of him, and it is so abrupt a change that Obito blinks, startled.

“Who’s the martyr now?” Kakashi asks, and his voice is emotionless, flat.

“I — that’s not…” Obito finds himself, very abruptly, at a loss for words. 

_It’s not the same,_ he wants to protest, and can’t get the sentence out of his mouth.

Kakashi regards him coldly. “That’s what I thought.”

He turns and leaves without a word, door closing behind him, leaving Obito standing motionless in the middle of the floor, unable to think of a single thing to say.

It is hours before he returns, and by then the initial shock of his announcement has worn away enough that all Obito’s gut-reaction fury has dissipated, replaced by shame that gnaws at his insides and keeps him up long past midnight, waiting for footsteps on the stairs.

He knows that Kakashi knows he’s awake, can tell from the way he pauses almost imperceptibly outside the door before he lets himself in. For a long moment, he simply stands in the doorway, silhouetted by moonlight, casting a long shadow on the floor. 

Obito stands, hesitantly, knees protesting a little after sitting in the same position on the couch for so many hours. “Kakashi.”

Kakashi doesn’t say a word, but steps inside and closes the door, leaving them both in pitch-blackness. Obito waits for his eyes to adjust till he can just make out Kakashi’s shape in the gloom. He hasn’t moved.

“Kakashi,” he tries again. “I’m… sorry.”

Silence.

“I’m sorry,” Obito repeats, moving ever-so-slightly closer, not particularly wanting to infringe on Kakashi’s personal space at a time like this. “I shouldn’t have said what I did.”

Still nothing, and honestly, Obito should probably just give up now, pack his bags and hit the road for another eight years, because he’s obviously not going to get anything —

“I didn’t know if you’d still be here,” Kakashi says very quietly, “when I came back.”

That draws Obito up short. “What?”

He can see Kakashi’s head turn, can feel his eyes on him in the dark. “I thought you might have left.”

There are a lot of ways Obito could take that statement, and Kakashi’s tone really isn’t telling him much at the moment, so he opts for the worst-case scenario. “Do you — want me to —?”

“No, that’s not…” Kakashi sighs. “I don’t — that’s not what I meant. I… didn’t know if you’d want to stay. After all that.”

As though this entire situation isn’t Obito’s fault in the first place. Typical Kakashi, he thinks, but there’s no anger in it this time, only exhaustion. 

_Time to move past it,_ says the voice, and Obito gives in.

“Kakashi,” he says, spreading his hands in the only peace offering he knows how to make, “where else would I go?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (of course, if you don't think there are more emotional train wrecks of a different sort on their way, you've got another thing coming.)
> 
> also: minor edits for typos, because I am a very tired trash heap who thinks writing after a full day of work is a great plan, apparently


	7. entre nous

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess what! This fic isn't abandoned! I just.... couldn't think of how to write this chapter, or what I wanted to happen in it. Came up with like five different ideas that didn't work. That, combined with me over-committing myself to various real life things as usual, meant that the idea of this update sat in my brain gathering dust for over a month. Ouch.
> 
> Thankfully, the outline for the next chapter has been blazing bright in my head almost since I came up with the idea for this fic, so that one should be up a hell of a lot sooner. Hurrah! Thanks for reading.

Kakashi is sprawled on the couch, watching the wind rustle the leaves outside the window and absentmindedly debating whether or not he ought to be doing something productive, when the low murmur of voices coming from the direction of the front door snaps him out of his reverie.

He swings his feet off the couch and sits up, instantly tense, straining to hear. They had good reasons for relocating out here, after all, all the way past the training grounds, at the very edge of the village. For all that Obito’s reformed himself, for all that Minato’s seals have locked away the vast majority of his chakra and rendered him almost startlingly average, there’s been a current of quiet distrust running underneath Konoha ever since word of his return spread. Entirely understandable, honestly, but Kakashi had still wanted to spare Obito the worst of it, if he could, and all Kakashi’s confidantes had agreed.

(None of them had asked if he was doing it to spare himself, too, not Sai, not Shikamaru, not Naruto or Sakura. For that, Kakashi is intensely, silently grateful.)

Still, everyone knows they’re out here by now, even if for the most part they’ve been left alone, and Kakashi can’t help but sleep with one eye open, waiting for what he feels is the inevitable explosion, literal or figurative. Something’s going to give, sooner or later. Someone’s going to snap, and Kakashi doesn’t plan for the two of them to be caught unawares when that happens.

_Which could be right now,_ his mind supplies helpfully. Kakashi grimaces.

He moves slowly and silently towards the door, kunai ready to be thrown at a moment’s notice. But the voices don’t sound hard or angry, and as he draws closer he recognizes Obito’s:

“—know you’re probably here to see Kakashi, but I’ve been meaning to talk to you.”

“Oh?” That’s Tenzo’s voice, intentionally placid, and Kakashi relaxes instantly. Tenzo is the furthest thing they have from an enemy. Still, he doesn’t think he’s ever heard the two of them have a conversation, and so he pauses just before turning the corner and settles against the wall, curious to hear where Obito’s train of thought is going.

“I…” A hesitation. “I owe you an apology.”

There is a silence. Kakashi waits, hardly daring to breathe.

“For what happened to you. During the war.” Obito’s discomfort is almost palpable, even without being able to see his face; Kakashi can imagine his twisted mouth and furrowed brow, the way his fingers are probably knotted together in his lap. "For what was done to you, on my orders."

The silence continues unabated. Kakashi is on the verge of making an entrance to dispel the tension when he hears Obito laugh humorlessly, a bitter and broken noise.

“If I’m being honest, I should spend the rest of my life roaming the earth and apologizing to everyone on it, but that’s not really — I don’t know what good it’d do. At this point.” A sigh. “You know what? Forget I said anything. I think Kakashi’s in the living room, if you’re looking for him.”

“I won’t,” Tenzo says, quiet.

“… won’t what?”

“Forget. That you said anything.” Kakashi hears a quiet exhale. “You have to know, Obito, that your apology and your regrets can’t change what happened, but — it means something to me that you offered them.”

A pause. 

“Besides,” Tenzo offers, trying for nonchalant but missing by a mile, “I built you the house, so.”

It’s true. He did build them the house. Kakashi still isn’t sure how Tenzo found out so quickly they were developing an exit strategy; one day he’d scouted out a suitably far-flung patch of land, just to see, and the next morning when he’d returned there’d been an entire home there, doors flung wide to let in the summer breeze, every sculpted arch and seamless join screaming _Tenzo did this._ When Kakashi had confronted him about it, he’d just shrugged. “Figured you’d need one,” he had said, in that same striving-for-casual-and-failing tone Kakashi knows all too well after so many years.

It is, Kakashi thinks, as close to a “you’re forgiven” as Obito is likely to ever get. He hopes Obito’s capable of recognizing it as such.

There is another pause, and then a soft snort. “You built _Kakashi_ the house,” Obito corrects, voice surprisingly gentle: message received.

“That’s… not inaccurate,” Tenzo admits. “But he cares about you a great deal more than I first realized. So I built it for you, too.”

“Hmm,” Obito returns, sounding thoughtful, and then the silence begins anew. 

Now, Kakashi thinks a little desperately, is the time to interrupt, before they start getting into the realm of… of _feelings,_ or something. 

“Tenzo!” he says brightly, striding onto the porch. “Why, I didn’t even realize you were here.”

The look on Tenzo’s face says plainly he isn’t fooled in the least. Kakashi treasures that look; he’s had fewer and fewer opportunities to earn it recently. He graces Tenzo with his cheeriest sunbeams-and-kittens smile, just for kicks.

“Right.” Obito’s voice is dry as a bone. “I believe that’s my cue.” He clambers out of the hammock he’s been lounging in, wincing a little as he stretches stiff muscles. “You two have fun. I’ll be inside, pretending I can’t feel in my very soul how hard you’re rolling your eyes, Yamato.”

That startles a surprised laugh out of Tenzo (always Tenzo to Kakashi, no matter what he insists on calling himself), and Kakashi grins at Obito’s receding back. He’s missed that sense of humor since they were on Team 7 together.

When he turns back, Tenzo is watching him knowingly.

“What?” he says, feeling suddenly defensive.

“How long are you going to pretend you don’t feel the way you feel about him, Kakashi?”

Kakashi swallows, mouth suddenly a little dry. “Are you trying to imply something?”

Tenzo throws up his hands. “I’m not implying anything! It’s blatantly obvious! You look at him like he hung every single star in the sky just for you.”

“Surely that’s a _little_ exaggerated…” 

“I promise you, it isn’t.” Tenzo sighs and scrubs a hand across his face. “Look, you do what you want with your life, alright? But you can’t keep this up forever. Sooner or later, something’s going to give.”

Kakashi shivers at the echo of his earlier thoughts. 

“I just want him to be safe and happy for a while, Tenzo,” he says finally, leaning against the porch railing. “This house is the one place he’ll always be welcome; you know that as well as I do. He doesn’t need me to ruin that for him.” _Not when so many others are undoubtedly itching to ruin it in their own ways._

“Take a page out of one of your awful books and take a leap of faith once in a while, Kakashi. You might be pleasantly surprised.”

A leap of faith. Kakashi thinks of a twelve-year-old with flyaway blond hair, too big of a mouth for his own good, and the Kyuubi’s chakra running through his veins. Not many people would have taken a leap of faith on Naruto, but enough of them did, in the end, and the world was fundamentally changed. Pleasant surprise, indeed.

Confessing his feelings to Obito wouldn’t lead to anything quite so earth-shattering, he is sure, but it’s a valid point.

“I’ll think about it,” he allows finally, and earns an approving nod; time for a change of subject. “Now, how would you like to come in for tea?”

“Only if I don’t have to drink out of one of those homemade mugs,” Tenzo grouses, but follows him inside.


	8. vital signs

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter this time around, but on the bright side it's arrived that much sooner, am I right?

“—to. _Obito._ ”

He struggles up from the depths of sleep and tries to open his eyes only to find that there’s a wet washcloth draped across his forehead. When he attempts to sit up, a piercing pain shoots through his skull. He groans.

Hands press him back into the bed, gently. “Lie still for a bit.”

The voice is Kakashi’s, and worried. Obito’s tongue sticks to the roof of his mouth when he opens it to reply; his bottom lip splits, and the old-iron taste of blood makes his stomach lurch. “Water,” he croaks. When was the last time his mouth was so dry?

A straw is held to his lips, and he drinks greedily. “You’re burning up with fever,” Kakashi says quietly, “and you were crying out in your sleep. Were you feeling sick when you went to bed?”

Through the haze of pain and nausea, Obito thinks about it. He had, in fact, had a headache; part of why he had called it a night so early. But he hadn’t felt anything like this. Right now Obito would like nothing better than to crawl out of his own skin.

“Not really,” he manages, reluctantly letting the straw fall away. “Nothing this bad.”

Kakashi makes a wordless noise of concern. “Symptoms?”

“Headache, an awful one, right behind my eyes. Nausea.” Obito considers briefly. “My skin feels like it’s too tight.”

He hears Kakashi draw in a breath and shift decisively. “I’m going to get Sakura.”

“No, don’t.” Obito reaches out for Kakashi’s wrist, holding him in place, suddenly reluctant to be left alone. “Stay a little longer.”

Kakashi lets out a breath that’s almost a sigh, but he doesn’t move, and Obito counts it as a victory. He keeps his fingers wrapped around Kakashi’s wrist and brings his other hand to his face, pressing the damp washcloth against his eyes and savoring the feeling of cool water running down his temples. “That’s better,” he murmurs.

In the silence that follows he realizes Kakashi has gone very, very still.

“What?” Obito asks into air that’s suddenly thick with tension.

“Obito,” and oh, he’s never heard that tone in Kakashi’s voice before. “Your wrists…”

Kakashi rubs a thumb over his wrist, and it _burns._ Obito hisses and pulls away. “What are you _doing?_ ”

He doesn’t give Kakashi a chance to answer, pulling the washcloth away from his face and holding his wrist up to his eyes, blinking till the blurriness fades. Even the faint light from the hallway makes his head pound and his stomach swim, but he squints until he can see properly, and —

the seals on his wrists are _roiling,_ angry and alive, under skin that’s puffy and red. Obito sucks in a sharp breath. 

He sits up, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment against the agonizing ache in his head; curls over himself in a futile attempt to tame the stomach pain — but he pulls himself together, and gingerly prods a seal.

The pain lances up his arm, but — now the seals are changing, shrinking, folding in on themselves, becoming narrower and more compact. Under Obito’s gaze they become so small he can barely make them out, and then — nothing —

a rush of power floods his entire body, making his hair stand on end. His headache vanishes, and takes the nausea with it; he feels sweat bead on his forehead as the fever breaks. Obito shudders in surprise and makes a low, incoherent noise.

“Obito?” Kakashi’s voice is pitched higher than normal, laced with uncertainty and something that sounds suspiciously like fear. “Look at me.”

Obito drags his eyes from his startlingly bare wrists and meets Kakashi’s gaze, only to watch him recoil as though he’s been burned, face going white.

He already knows what Kakashi sees; he knew the instant he looked up and saw the shifting lines of possibility and probability tangled in the air around them like a spider’s web. It’s been nearly a decade, but Obito hasn’t forgotten what it was like to _see._

Lurching to his feet, grim certainty settling leaden in his chest, he staggers to the mirror in the corner. He might already know, but he has to be _sure,_ beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Obito’s reflection stares back at him with all-too-familiar red-black eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I figured I owe you all some sort of an update, since all the comments I've seen recently could be summed up along the lines of "please keep writing this I want to read the next chapter :(((("
> 
> I haven't abandoned this fic, I promise! Life has just thrown me many, many curveballs recently, on top of a schedule that I've known since the beginning of the year was going to get busier as 2017 progressed. But I am in fact working on Chapter 9. That's another part of the delay - there are a few different ways I could go with the story from here on out, and I've been trying to decide which one does it justice, which has led to several rewrites and plot changes for this next chapter as I test out different ideas.
> 
> Also: I haven't responded to any individual comments recently, but please know that I read and cherish them all, and all the people that leave them. The fact that people are out there reading my story and enjoying it is what gives me the drive to keep going! 
> 
> When will the next update be, though? I can't say for sure. But it is going to happen! And hopefully it won't take another two months.
> 
> -M, 6/18/17


	9. the weapon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Man, oh man, oh man. I did not mean at all for this to take so long, and I'm sorry about that. But thank you to everyone who's still reading! I'm going to go through and reply to your comments individually later. Your enjoyment of this fic means more to me than you realize.
> 
> At least this chapter is longer than usual. Plot advancement! I hope the end doesn't feel too abrupt, but I really couldn't think of a good place to cut this one off unless I got into some of what I had planned for the next chapter. We'll just roll with it.

“‘These don’t have to be permanent,’” Kakashi echoes, disbelieving.

From his spot on the couch, leaning forward with elbows on knees and fingers interlaced, Obito looks up. “That’s what he said.”

His eyes are red and black, the colors shockingly intense; tomoe spin lazily, nauseatingly, as he watches Kakashi pace out endless laps of their living room. Kakashi can’t help the way his stomach lurches. He turns away quickly, but not quite soon enough to miss the ever-so-slight tightening of Obito’s jaw.

“So what?” He runs a hand through his hair. “Did the seals contain some sort of time limit? Or…” he fishes desperately for ideas, “a location trigger? Maybe—“

“You didn’t hear the second part,” Obito says quietly. 

Kakashi wheels. “You didn’t say there _was_ a second part.”

Obito’s gaze is steady; Kakashi forces himself not to look away. “He also said, ‘Everyone has the capacity for change.’”

It takes Kakashi a moment to process that, and another moment to work through the implications. He sits down slowly in the nearest chair.

“You’re saying,” he says carefully, “that you think the seals incorporated a… morality sensor?”

“For lack of a better term? That’d be my best guess.” Obito looks down at his bare wrists and snorts softly. “Classic Minato.”

It is, indeed, the sort of thing Minato would do, if Obito’s telling is accurate; and Kakashi has to believe that it is, for the sake of his own sanity if nothing else. He lets out a long, slow breath, trying to calm his jangling nerves. There’s something wrong with Obito’s theory, and if he puzzles over it long enough he can distract himself from the stark reality of their situation.

“It makes so little sense,” he says, shaking his head slightly. “Why now, specifically? What’s different about you right now than the person you’ve been for the past eight years?”

Obito looks up sharply at that, eyes widening a little, gaze going unfocused. Kakashi doesn’t have the mental resources to wonder why, too wrapped up in his train of thought.

“Why even create the seals in the first place, if he planned for them to disappear later?” he continues. “He had to know that a situation like this could create all sorts of problems.”

The village, the village, the village. Everything always comes back to Konoha, in the end, just as it has Kakashi’s entire life. When he looks at Obito with his red and terrible eyes he sees, for a moment, the masked figure who rained destruction down on them all without an ounce of remorse. Even after everything that’s passed between them, it’s still hard for Kakashi to push the base, instinctual terror and anger aside; it’s going to be harder, he knows, for the average denizen of Konoha, be they civilian or shinobi. And can he really blame them for that?

Didn’t he accuse Obito, not too long ago, of believing the world revolved around him? And yet Kakashi has managed to make the same mistake. The storm has returned, his retirement notwithstanding, and he is powerless to stop it. Foolish of him to ever imagine otherwise. 

They’ll be coming, any minute now, an entire legion of shinobi ready to take Obito down by any means necessary. Kakashi knows a chakra spike of this magnitude won’t have gone undetected, and someone’s bound to have drawn the obvious conclusion. All that remains, then, is to wait for the inevitable. 

Obito stiffens, head snapping towards the entrance, and Kakashi realizes with a chill that they won’t have long to wait. 

He too can feel, now, one tight burst of chakra after the other as his perimeter wards are tripped. Someone’s coming, and fast. There’s no time to think or plan; he draws a kunai and makes for the door.

One thing is certain, despite the way his gut twists whenever he meets that crimson gaze: if they want to get to Obito, they’ll have to go through him first.

What he isn’t expecting — what makes him draw up short in surprise — is the knock, a disarmingly polite three taps.

He looks back towards Obito, thrown off balance, and despite the lines of tension in his body Obito shrugs, a little wildly; _what the hell have we got to lose?_

Kakashi turns back towards the door, heart thumping in his chest. “Um… come in?” 

(Behind him Obito makes an incredulous noise, which he ignores.)

The door swings slowly open, and Kakashi throws up a hand to shield his eyes from the early-morning sunlight. There’s just one figure silhouetted in the doorway, casting long shadows across the floor. It’s not possible to make out the face, not till his eyes adjust, but — that spiky ponytail, that practiced slouch, can only belong to one person. Kakashi exhales.

“Shikamaru,” he says, relaxing just a fraction. Not that he’s under any illusions that they’re out of danger — far from it — but this particular man’s presence here, alone, suggests that someone, somewhere, has bought them some time.

“Whatever this is,” Shikamaru sighs, stepping inside, “for them to drag me out of bed this early in the morning, it had better be good.”

“Oh, it’s good, I promise you that.” That’s Obito, sardonic as ever. “Although I’d have to say it depends on how you define the word.”

He hasn’t moved from his spot on the couch. Kakashi knows full well that it’s an effort to look as unthreatening as possible. It won’t work on Shikamaru, of course, but he might recognize the intent behind it for what it is. If they’re lucky.

Shikamaru comes to a halt beside him, takes in the scene at a glance, and says nothing for a long, long moment before pinching the bridge of his nose, eyes squeezing shut.

“The two of you,” he mutters, “are the most troublesome people I know.”

Kakashi laughs shakily, a little hysterically. He can’t help it. The look Obito gives him is distinctly unimpressed.

“It might interest you to know,” Shikamaru continues, “that there are, oh, thirty or so fully-armed jounin and ANBU around the fringes of your property, and two entire companies mobilizing a bit down the road.” He turns a level gaze on Obito, with just a tinge of exasperation underneath. “So if you’ve got some sort of explanation for this that doesn’t involve attempting to overthrow various governments again, I’d love to hear it.”

Obito’s smile is crooked and humorless. “To be perfectly honest, I’m surprised I’m being given the chance.” 

“Well, if you wanted to avoid being killed on sight, you picked the right person to live with, for one.” Shikamaru sticks his hands in his pockets. “Besides, in case you hadn’t noticed, our current Hokage’s principal combat tactic could be best described as ‘talking to people,’ and his continued existence makes a pretty good case for it.” His eyes haven’t left Obito’s. “As does yours.”

It’s a subtle, yet pointed, reminder: _start explaining, now._ Obito tips his head in acknowledgment. “You’d better sit down,” he says. “It’s not the shortest story.”

Shikamaru hesitates a moment, barely noticeable, and in that instant Kakashi vividly remembers Shikaku, one of the more painful casualties of that bloodbath of a war, another death to be laid at Obito’s feet. He does sit, though, on the edge of an armchair, leaning forward with hands steepled, eyes sharp and intent.

As Obito begins to speak, Shikamaru’s eyebrows nearly hit his hairline, but he betrays no other expression. By the end, his eyes have narrowed into thoughtful slits. He sits in silence for a long moment.

“It’s pretty unbelievable,” he says at last, and Obito and Kakashi both tense. Seeing it, Shikamaru holds up his hands. “I’m not saying I think you’re lying — really, I’m not. But the burden of proof has got to be higher, for something this big.”

Kakashi guesses before Obito does, and his stomach turns. “You’re going to take him down to T&I.”

The thought of someone poring over Obito’s memories by force, impersonally scrutinizing every detail of his life, is horrifying. He’s already opened his mouth to object when Obito speaks, looking down at his hands.

“You can do whatever you want to me,” he says tiredly, meeting Shikamaru’s eyes. “As long as you leave him alone.”

“Obito, you—“

“Kakashi.” The look Obito fixes him with nearly takes his breath away. “I’ve been through far worse than this, and you’ve already given up enough on my account. I’m not going to let anything else happen to you because of me.”

Kakashi opens his mouth and closes it, unable to get any words past the lump in his throat.

“Well, that was interesting,” says Shikamaru after a too-long pause, “but entirely unnecessary.” The ghost of a smile crosses his face. “I was just going to take you to see Ino. And only if you wanted to come.”

“What happens if I say no?”

“Then I tell Naruto what you told me, and he takes it from there.” Shikamaru shrugs. “Although I can’t make any promises about the ANBU currently camping in your bushes.” 

Obito exhales, steady and slow. 

“I’d like some time to think about it,” he says finally, Sharingan eyes fixed on Shikamaru’s face, watching for a reaction.

Shikamaru nods, looking surprisingly placid. “Figured you might say something like that. I can come back tomorrow, and maybe get a few of these teams to back off on my way out… but not all of them.” 

He stands, stretching a little. “We might not see eye-to-eye on everything, Obito, but I want you to understand: we don’t want to hurt you. Not the Hokage, and not me. You’ve — we’ve — all been through enough.”

The sentiment, as far as Kakashi can tell, is genuine. Some of the tightness in his chest unclenches.

“Thank you, Shikamaru,” he says quietly. Shikamaru flaps a hand in his direction, already sinking back into his usual slouch as he turns toward the door.

“Don’t mention it.”


	10. red lenses

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Buckle up, kiddos, it's feelings time!

“What do you want for breakfast?” calls Kakashi from the kitchen, over the sounds of cabinets opening and pots being rearranged.

Obito’s still on the couch. He doesn’t plan on moving any time soon. “Not hungry,” he replies tersely, watching an errant fly buzz across the room; he can already guess, with 95 percent certainty, where it’s going to land.

Sage, but he hates this.

Not the Sharingan, per se; he hadn’t fully realized how much he was missing till it was restored. It’s refreshing to see clearly again, everything suddenly possessing brighter colors and sharper lines and defined paths through time as well as space. If that were all there was to it, Obito would be thrilled. But it’s not that simple. It never is, as much as he knows Kakashi wishes otherwise.

Even before this, their existence was precarious, living in isolation at the edge of a village that, by and large, distrusted them both. Now, with his powers restored? He and Kakashi may not be in imminent danger, but if they stay in Konoha they’ll be forever on a knife’s edge, where the slightest slip could provoke all-out conflict — barring some kind of miracle, that is. Obito’s pretty sure he’s used up his lifetime supply of those.

He’s pretty sure Kakashi has too, come to think of it, and that’s a damn shame. Kakashi’s gone from one of Konoha’s heroes to one of its outcasts practically overnight, all for trying to do what he thought was the right thing. It’s an eerie echo of his father’s legacy; the thought makes Obito’s gut twist. He doesn’t think Kakashi would take his own life, at least — although maybe he just doesn’t want to imagine it. 

Obito rubs his eyes, feeling drained. Damn Kakashi, with his persistent self-sacrificial tendencies, his stubborn unwillingness to give up on Obito even though his life is in shambles. “Why?” he mutters to himself.

_He cares about you,_ Yamato’s voice in his head reminds him. Obito sighs.

The most obvious course of action would be to leave again, exactly the way he came: with no forewarning whatsoever. Kamui has its conveniences. But he can’t bring himself to do it and leave an unsuspecting Kakashi behind.

Fantastic. Just peachy. Two idiots who both care too much despite the fact they’re ruining everything; they deserve each other, really and truly. Obito drops his head into his hands.

The knowledge of what he has to do begins to settle lead-heavy in his gut.

Silence has fallen in the kitchen, and he hears approaching footsteps. “Obito?” Kakashi asks, worried. “Are you alright?”

Obito looks up. Kakashi doesn’t flinch this time, to his credit; his brow is furrowed with concern.

_Now. You have to start now._

“I’ll go with Shikamaru, when he comes back,” he says, and hears Kakashi suck in a breath. “But Kakashi — that won’t fix it. Any of it. You have to know that.” 

Kakashi looks away, pained; he did know, clearly, but was pretending not to. That somehow aches more than all the rest.

“I didn’t want this,” Obito continues, a little desperately. “Dammit, Kakashi, I would have lived in this stupid house with you forever, doing a whole lot of nothing, and I would have been fine with it. I would have _loved_ it.” He’s on his feet now; he barely noticed standing. “The Sharingan can go to hell. I didn’t _want it._ ” 

He pauses for breath. “But,” he continues, and falters, suddenly self-conscious, as he becomes aware of the shocked intensity of Kakashi’s gaze on him, the way he’s gone very still.

Obito swallows hard and presses on. “But it didn’t work out that way, obviously, and now everyone’s going to hate me even more than they already did, and, well. We need to start making plans.”

Now comes the hard part. Obito drops his eyes; he can’t make himself look at Kakashi for this.

“I need to go, Kakashi. I’m the source of the problem here. Not you.” He takes a shaky, painful breath past the sudden lump in his throat. “If I leave — if I get as far away from here as possible — you can stay. I know they’d let you stay. I know they’d want you to.” Breathe in, breathe out. “It’d be for the best.”

_It wouldn’t be best for you,_ part of him insists. But this isn’t about him. Everything and everyone Kakashi has ever loved or cared about is here. Obito’s been alone in every way that matters for most of his life; he can get used to it again. He grits his teeth and grinds his emotions into dust remorselessly, as though they were bothersome insects.

There is a long silence.

“You’d be unhappy,” Kakashi says finally, and his voice is the softest Obito’s ever heard it.

Damn it. 

“I spent years terrorizing the entire world.” Obito grins bleakly, determined not to let the façade slip. “Who _cares_ whether I’m happy or not?”

He still isn’t looking at Kakashi head-on, but he doesn’t miss the way he moves deliberately, carefully closer, until he’s well within arm’s length.

“I do,” says Kakashi.

Obito looks up at him, a little startled, and nearly forgets how to breathe at the expression on Kakashi’s face, sorrow and tenderness in equal measure.

“Your happiness is important to me,” Kakashi says, still quiet. “You’re important to me. I thought you would have figured that out by now.”

_You picked the wrong person to get attached to,_ Obito wants to say, but his mouth has gone dry.

Kakashi steps forward, intentionally telegraphing his movements as he reaches out. Even so, Obito still isn’t expecting to be pulled into — into a _hug._

He sucks in a surprised breath, mind automatically cataloguing sensations. Kakashi’s body is warm and solid against his. He smells of soap and tea, and his hair tickles Obito’s cheek. When he breathes, unsteady, Obito feels the rise and fall of his ribcage.

How long, he wonders absentmindedly, has it been since he was this physically close to another person? Years; decades, even. A long time. Maybe that’s why his chest feels tight and strange, why he felt the blood rush to his cheeks the instant Kakashi wrapped his arms around him. It’s just the intensity of a novel situation, that’s all. 

He remembers belatedly that hugs are a mutual thing, and puts his arms around Kakashi’s torso, a little uncertainly. In the vicinity of his shoulder Kakashi huffs something that might be a laugh. Obito’s gearing up to get mock-offended (it’d be a nice distraction, too, from this — whatever it is — that he’s feeling), but Kakashi’s already speaking.

“Obito,” he says, voice affectionate and soft and so close to Obito’s ear that he’s getting goosebumps, “if you honestly thought you could go on your own and leave me here, you’re underestimating me.”

That — he —

Oh.

Obito realizes several things at once.

In the internal turmoil that follows, one memory rises straight to the surface, Kakashi’s frustrated question from earlier this morning: _what’s different about you right now than the person you’ve been for the past eight years?_

_Minato,_ Obito thinks, dizzy, tightening his arms around Kakashi, burying his face in his shoulder, _you were one damn idealistic fool if you really thought love was going to fix everything._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bet you weren't expecting that, were you? Or maybe you were. I did warn you about the feelings.


	11. emotion detector

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trust me when I tell you I'm as happy to see this update as you are. Has it really been over six months since I started writing this thing?
> 
> The main thing this chapter has going for it is that it had to be written before I could get to the next one, which I've been itching to do for a while now. Eh. You do what you can with what you have, and all that.

Ever since their conversation yesterday morning, Obito’s been acting — strange.

Kakashi thought, at first, that he’d caused it, hugging him like that. But no — after a few moments of uncertainty, Obito had leaned into the embrace, held him tighter, exhaled shakily into his shoulder. It had been… nice. Better than nice. Not that Kakashi would ever dare to let on.

But since then — since Obito finally let go and stepped back, looking a little dazed — there’s been more distance between them than Kakashi can remember there being in months. Obito’s been oddly quiet, strangely remote. He’d spent nearly the entire afternoon yesterday on the couch, wordlessly staring off into space. Every so often Kakashi had caught Obito watching him, a speculative furrow between his brows, as though he were a particularly tricky puzzle in need of solving. 

It’s... well, it’s unsettling. Kakashi’s used to blistering wit and good-humored badmouthing, to Obito humming tunelessly as he putters around the house. Not this stillness and silence.

He watches Obito a little warily over his mug of tea. There’s a plate of toast sitting in front of him nearly untouched, butter congealing in the morning breeze coming off the back porch. Obito’s gazing at the kitchen doorframe as though the secrets of the universe might be hidden in the woodgrain; he hasn’t said a word since he walked in and sat down. Honestly, Kakashi might as well be eating breakfast with a brick wall.

It could be because of their current predicament. Shikamaru’s going to be back any minute, after all. But Kakashi knows Obito well enough by now to know his normal threat response, and this isn’t it. At the moment, though, it’s the most plausible theory he has.

He decides to test it out, setting down his mug. “Shikamaru ought to be here soon.”

“Mm.” Obito’s gaze doesn’t leave the wall. 

“Are you still going to go?”

There is a moment’s pause. Then Obito turns to meet his eyes. “Only if they let you come with me.”

It’s the most he’s said in 24 hours. That, combined with the blazing intensity of his gaze, renders Kakashi temporarily speechless with surprise.

He’s saved from having to come up with a response by a now-familiar knock at the door. Obito pushes back from the table. “I’ll get it.”

Kakashi blinks, shakes himself a little, and follows.

Shikamaru is waiting, expression disinterested; it would almost be believable if not for the sharpness of his eyes. He opens his mouth to speak.

“I’m not going,” says Obito preemptively. Both Shikamaru and Kakashi tense. “Unless he goes too.”

He punctuates this with a jerk of his head towards Kakashi; Shikamaru’s eyes follow the motion. Kakashi meets his gaze, pleading silently: _it’ll be easier for all of us this way. Please._

Shikamaru looks steadily at him for a long moment, then turns back to Obito, who — for all his calculated stillness — practically radiates defiance. A heartbeat, two, and then he dips his head in acquiescence. “Nothing's ever simple with you, is it,” he says, resignedly, and it’s not a question, not really.

“Wouldn’t be any fun,” replies Obito, the barest hint of a sharp-edged smile touching the corner of his mouth. Kakashi remembers how to breathe again, then. There’s the Obito he’s been missing.

Shikamaru’s eyes linger on Obito a moment longer, assessing, before he turns away. “We’d,” he glances towards the rising sun, “better get going.”

Kakashi sees the way Obito sets his shoulders, the resoluteness in his eyes as he pulls the front door shut behind him. Clearly he hasn’t discounted the possibility that this is all an elaborate trap designed to lure him right into the hands of those who would rather see him locked away forever, or worse. Kakashi knows better, or thinks he does; Shikamaru’s never been anything less than honest with him, and Naruto is still Naruto, Hokage or not. But that doesn’t change the fact that from Obito’s perspective, leaving here is like walking into a lion’s den. And yet he’s going anyway, because Kakashi’s coming with him. Kakashi’s chest tightens. 

He walks in step with Obito down the dirt path that leads off their property, Shikamaru following behind at a reasonable distance. Invisible, yet all around them, are a legion of ANBU, tense and watchful; sometimes Kakashi thinks he catches one out of the corner of his eye. All things considered, it’s a reasonable precaution from the village’s perspective, but it still puts him on edge. If the tightness of Obito’s jaw is anything to go by, he feels the same.

“Take a left up here,” Shikamaru calls, and Kakashi frowns; that road leads directly into the village. 

“Where are we going?” he asks over his shoulder.

“Where else?” Shikamaru has always done exasperation better than anyone. “To Ino’s house, of course.” 

A show of trust, then. A good-faith gesture. Kakashi will take whatever he can get today.

This part of Konoha is nearly deserted so early on a weekend morning. Even the fruit sellers aren’t out yet. The timing makes sense; the fewer prying eyes to see for themselves the return of Uchiha Obito in all his old and terrible power, the better. Kakashi is pathetically, quietly grateful that they don’t meet a single soul on their way. He’s not sure he could handle the frightened whispers that would surely follow in their wake, especially not from people he knows.

Obito takes it all in, face carefully expressionless, eyes roving. None of this, Kakashi realizes, will be familiar to him, not with the rebuilding they had to do after Pein’s attack. Just another of the tragedies with Obito’s handprint on them.

It hurts. Probably it’ll always hurt. But Kakashi sees every day the person Obito has spent the last decade trying to become, and that’s enough to ease the pain, a little. He hopes Ino can see the same Obito that he does.

Right now that’s the only hope either of them have.

It’s easy to tell when they’ve reached Ino’s house; there are flowers everywhere, blooming in neat rows along the front walk, spilling out of window boxes, clustered in pots along the edges of the stoop, all meticulously tended to. Kakashi finds that encouraging. He knows full well that Ino has grown into someone thoughtful and steady and capable; it’s nice to see that it carries over into even the smallest details.

He climbs the steps and raises his fist to knock, but the door swings open before he gets the chance, with Ino on the other side. 

“Kakashi,” she says, with a small smile but genuine warmth, and gives Shikamaru a nod of acknowledgement. Then her eyes flick to Obito, and her features become decidedly more neutral. Shikamaru wasn’t the only one to lose a parent at the hands of this man, after all.

“You’d better come in,” she says, and turns away. Obito hesitates for the barest moment before he follows. Kakashi and Shikamaru are close behind — and the ANBU too, of course. Of course.

It’s darker in Ino’s house, the day still young enough that there’s not much light coming through the south-facing windows. When Kakashi emerges from the foyer into a larger room, Ino is already sitting at a low table, steadily regarding Obito across from her. 

Shikamaru passes him to take the seat on Ino’s right. Which leaves — well. Kakashi folds himself onto the remaining cushion at Obito’s left, and takes a deep breath, and waits, feeling their ANBU escorts flow around the table to take up positions all around the room’s perimeter.

There is silence for several long moments more while Ino and Obito keep up their staring match. Kakashi learned long ago not to shift with discomfort — a necessary skill for even the lowest-ranked shinobi — but right now he’s itching to do just that; the tension in the room is almost a living thing, breathing down all of their necks.

“Here is what will happen,” says Ino suddenly, and the words are more formal than anything Kakashi’s ever heard from her, almost scripted in their cadence. “I need to examine any memories that can corroborate your version of events. You can—” she frowns, searching for a word — “ _push_ them to the front of your mind; it should be instinctive enough. Likewise, you can shield anything you don’t wish me to see.” Her gaze sharpens. “Be advised, however, that if you willfully conceal relevant information from me, I will take it by force if necessary. Do you understand?”

Obito doesn’t move, but Kakashi knows better than anyone how his stillness is a warning, a weapon. “By force.”

“I don’t want to,” Ino admits frankly, sounding more like her usual self, leaning forward with hands clasped on the table. “It’ll be messy and unpleasant for us both. And these two.” She indicates Shikamaru and Kakashi with a tilt of her head. “But the choices are pretty simple: we either get through this, or it gets escalated up the leadership chain. And I promise you, whatever happens after that isn’t up to me.” She takes a deep breath that shakes a little; Kakashi realizes that she might, in fact, be as afraid as Obito is. “So… I’m asking you to cooperate. That’s all.”

Obito’s left hand clenches into a fist. Seeing it, both Ino and Shikamaru tense. 

Kakashi has to do something. “Obito,” he says, softly, and Obito turns just a little to look at him, eyes red as blood. “Please.”

_Please,_ he begs silently, _Obito, this is the only way and I wish it wasn’t, but I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to you — I’ll be right here the whole time, I won’t let them — please —_

Something softens a little in Obito’s gaze. Slowly, he relaxes his hand. Kakashi doesn’t think he’s imagining the nearly-inaudible sighs of relief from across the table.

“I understand,” Obito says finally, breaking away from Kakashi’s eyes to regard Ino again. “I’ll comply — provided you don’t touch anything you’re not supposed to.” He tips his chin up, just the faintest spark of defiance. “Do that, and you’ll regret it more than anything else you’ve done.”

Ino nods slowly. “Understood.” She smooths her hands across the tabletop. “Let’s begin.”

Considering the gravity of the situation, the magnitude of what exactly is being done, it’s an oddly quiet process. Ino’s hands frame Obito’s temples, and her eyes are shut, her brow furrowed in concentration. Shikamaru’s hand is on her shoulder, a ready reserve of chakra should she need him; his eyes are closed, too. It goes without saying that Obito’s eyelids are nearly screwed shut. Kakashi suspects he’s the only one at this table with the slightest bit of awareness of what’s going on around them. Maybe that’s why they allowed him here.

Or maybe —

Obito’s breaths are coming short and sharp; sweat beads on his brow. His palms are pressed against the table so hard that it creaks, fingers splayed wide. As far as Kakashi knows, this shouldn’t be a painful process, but there’s nothing that says it can’t be highly unpleasant. He looks at Obito, whose muscles are so tight his body trembles, and feels his heart ache.

Instinctually, he reaches out and lays his hand over Obito’s. All the comfort he has to give.

Obito starts a little, with a shocked inhale, but his features smooth out slightly, and some of the awful tension in his frame begins to ease. Faintly, he sighs.

At the same moment, Ino’s brows fly up in surprise. 

She lets go of Obito a few seconds later, pulling away and opening her eyes. Kakashi frowns, because she looks… startled. For the space of several breaths she just stares at Obito, almost wonderingly; Obito, for his part, has a flush creeping across his cheekbones. But he won’t look away, not till she does. Kakashi knows this about him, too.

He looks between the two of them, intensely curious, more than a little worried. Finally Ino sighs and leans back, rubbing a shaky hand across her face. She exchanges a long glance with Shikamaru, and it may as well have contained an entire conversation; Shikamaru’s eyes widen a little, and he looks at Obito, too, then at Kakashi. Kakashi gazes back, bewildered. _Ino, what did you see?_

“Well?” Obito’s always been good at breaking silences, when he wants to.

“We’ll need to discuss our findings with village leadership,” Ino says. Again that glance at Shikamaru, heavy with unspoken meaning. “But — preliminarily, you understand — I don’t see any reason to doubt your story, as unbelievable as that would have seemed half an hour ago.”

Kakashi lets out the breath he didn’t realize he was holding. Obito is already pushing back from the table. “So we can go now.”

Ino looks like she wants to say something else, but stops herself. “Yes,” she says instead. “We’ll be in touch. Or, well, someone will.”

By the time she finishes, Obito’s already halfway down the hall. Kakashi manages a hurried goodbye before he follows at a half-jog. Shikamaru doesn’t follow; the implications of that will escape him till later.

“What was that all about?” he asks, finally catching up on the front stoop. Sage, but Obito was booking it out of there.

“Which part?” Obito fires back, not looking at him. “The part where she spent the past thirty minutes digging through my mind to try and prove I’m not lying out my ass? I know you sometimes have trouble keeping up, Kakashi, but even you should have been able to figure that one out.”

It’s not like he’s unfamiliar with Obito’s acid tongue, especially when he’s trying to change the subject. But it stings, today, more than usual. Kakashi draws back, a little hurt and not entirely sure why.

“You know that’s not what I meant,” he presses. “I meant the part where she looked at you like she’d seen a ghost, or something.” _And you went all red in the face,_ he thinks but doesn’t say. Kakashi knows how far he can push, most of the time, and that’s too far right now.

Obito shakes his head, brief and irritated like he’s trying to shoo away an annoying insect. “I don’t know.”

_You’re lying._ Kakashi couldn’t say how he knows, but he does.

But he hums noncommittally, and follows Obito back towards home.


	12. prime mover

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MERRY CHRISTMAS HERE'S AN UPDATE
> 
> uhhhhhhhhh this chapter can basically be described as "everything happens so much" or, alternatively, "the author has been second-guessing every detail of this for months so please let's just get it over with"

The moon is beautiful tonight.

Not a full moon, or Obito wouldn’t be out here on the porch. Too many shitty memories, the full moon. No: this moon is a crescent, hanging low and huge and golden at the edge of the sky the way it only ever does at the start of fall. Because it is fall, now. The wind rustles through dry leaves, carrying the smells of plant decay and woodsmoke. Nights have gotten chillier, but still not _cold_ , not yet. Perfect conditions to lean against the porch railing and brood.

It’s not like he’s going to lie to himself about it. Brooding is exactly what he’s doing. He’s not sure what else to do, not really, because Ino _knows._

And if Ino knows, that means Shikamaru knows, which means…. everyone knows. Everyone that matters. Obito grimaces.

He heaves a sigh, shifting against the railing. Three days. It’s been three days (three and a half, really) since it happened, and they’ve gotten fuck-all in response. Probably the village is trying to decide what to do with them now. He can’t blame them; what are you _supposed_ to do when your most-feared former adversary goes and catches feelings for your retired leader? Is there some kind of action plan for that?

Hell, Obito needs to figure out his _own_ action plan. Because if everyone knows, then sooner or later Kakashi’s going to find out. And that’s — that’s unthinkable. He can’t know. Or, at the very least, he can’t know from _them._

The door swings open behind him. Obito doesn’t turn his head, but out of the corner of his eye he sees Kakashi settle against the railing next to him, hands loosely clasped, staring out at the sky and the trees.

“It’s a nice night,” Kakashi comments, after some time, sounding genuinely pleased. A strong gust of wind blows past and he leans into it, tipping his head up and closing his eyes.

Obito looks at him head-on, at his windblown, moonlit hair and the long line of his neck, and finds his mouth suddenly dry. “Yeah,” he manages, voice gone hoarse.

He’s fucked. He is so completely, utterly fucked.

“What’s bothering you?” asks Kakashi, opening one thoughtful eye. Of course. Too perceptive for his own good, the bastard.

Obito laughs, short and sharp. “Trust me,” he says, “you’re better off not knowing.”

“Am I?” Kakashi turns towards him, both eyes fixed on him now, still leaning against the railing casual as can be. “Because lately, the contents of your thoughts have been pretty high-stakes, to say the least.”

Shit. Obito swallows against the pit of ice in his stomach. “Did they get back to you?” _Did they tell you?_

“No.” Kakashi’s gaze is unwavering. “And the fact that they haven’t is precisely why I’m wondering what’s going on.”

This is not good. This is so many kinds of not good. Obito has to force his hands to give up their death grip on the banister.

“Look, it’s….” He takes a deep breath; he can’t do this, not now. “Kakashi, you’re just going to have to trust me on this one.”

Kakashi doesn’t reply. Yeah, that one probably wasn’t going to fly.

“Do you?” Obito dares to ask, out of options. “Trust me?”

He cannot read the depths of Kakashi’s gaze. The silence stretches razor-thin. Obito can only wait, heart in his throat.

“With my life,” says Kakashi, very quietly.

It’s too much. It is, all of a sudden, just too goddamn much. 

Well, thinks Obito, a little beyond rationality at this point, Kakashi was going to find out one way or another. Might as well go out with a bang.

He steps forward, directly into Kakashi’s personal space, and reaches out, and gets as far as his fingertips against the fabric of Kakashi’s mask before he stops, paralyzed, courage failing, because there’s no going back from this and he’s not sure he can handle that. Not when he’s probably about to ruin the one good thing in his life.

This close, he can feel Kakashi’s body heat in stark contrast to the night’s chill. He’s gone absolutely still, not even breathing as far as Obito can tell, and his eyes have not left Obito’s for an instant.

Obito waits for him to do something, anything. To ask what he’s doing. To tell him to stop. To pull back in shock and disgust. But Kakashi just watches him, motionless.

It occurs to him that Kakashi might be waiting for _him_ to do something.

Oh, fuck it, Obito thinks, and hooks his fingers in the edge of the mask, and pulls.

For a long minute all he can do is look. Kakashi’s features are surprisingly delicate, interspersed with bits of imperfection: a mole beneath the left corner of his mouth, and a long, long scar that runs down from his left eye, and laugh lines just beginning to show. Obito catalogues all this in a distant, automatic sort of way, because the only coherent thought left in his head is that Kakashi is the most beautiful person he’s ever seen. Kakashi, who is watching him with wide eyes and parted lips that he can _see_ and not just guess at. 

He steels himself, curves his hand around the back of Kakashi’s head, and leans in, fully expecting this to be the end of everything.

Kakashi meets him halfway. 

The press of Kakashi’s lips, warm and soft and careful, is nearly enough to bring Obito to his knees. His hands come to rest on Obito’s hips, so light and tentative he can barely feel them. 

It’s almost — chaste, and yet it is beyond anything Obito could ever have imagined for himself.

He pulls back after a few seconds, just enough to meet Kakashi’s gaze. Still unreadable, and Obito’s heart might be pounding, his stomach might be doing backflips, but that doesn’t mean he can’t muster up some of the old familiar irritation.

“Say something,” he demands, feeling utterly out of his depth, because this really cannot be happening, it can’t be. He can’t have just — _kissed Kakashi —_ he’ll wake up tomorrow morning and it’ll have been some kind of fever dream —

“You —” Kakashi’s voice cracks; he clears his throat and tries again. “You know, Obito, for all the times you’ve surprised me over the years, I think this might take the top slot.”

“Will you ever stop being ambiguous? Please just — tell me if I just made a huge mistake.” Obito has to remind himself to breathe. “Please.”

Kakashi’s hands tighten on his hips. “If it was a mistake,” he says, and pauses, heedless of the way Obito’s breath catches. “It’s one I wouldn’t mind you making again.”

It takes a moment for Obito to process that. “Fuck off, was that supposed to be a _line?_ ”

“Did it work?” Kakashi replies, mild as a spring day, but his eyes are warm, and there is a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. A _visible_ smile.

“You’re an asshole,” Obito informs him, even as his fingers curl into Kakashi’s flyaway silver hair. “An utterly insufferable asshole.”

“Ah, but I’m _your_ asshole,” says Kakashi philosophically, and Obito’s chest goes tight at the use of the possessive.

“Oh,” he retorts, trying desperately to regain his emotional footing, “are you? Cause that would go a long way towards explaining why you spew _shit_ all the time —”

Kakashi cuts him off with a kiss, not at all like the first; this one is deep and searing and makes his toes curl against the floorboards. Oh. 

The sound that escapes Obito’s mouth is, frankly, embarrassing. But who could blame him? Not like he had many opportunities for this kind of thing, in his old life, and now _Hatake Kakashi_ of all people is kissing him senseless on their front porch, when all he’d expected out of this evening was too much time alone with his thoughts. It’s a lot to process, so Obito thinks he can be forgiven if, maybe, that last moan could give any character in Kakashi’s trash novels a run for their money.

“A word of advice,” Kakashi breathes against his lips, his body pressed all against Obito’s, a long line of heat. “If you’re trying to be romantic, perhaps you shouldn’t imply that you’re suffering from some sort of chronic digestive ailment.” 

Obito growls. “ _Fuck_ you —“

Kakashi, mouthing along his jaw, makes a _very_ interested noise. Well. Obito didn’t mean for that to be a double entendre, but if the shoe fits.

He tilts his head back, eyes falling shut, fingers tightening in Kakashi’s hair, in the back of his shirt; his reward for that little display of trust is a scrape of teeth along his jugular that sends chills down his spine and leaves his head spinning. “Kakashi,” he gets out, voice catching a little on the last syllable, “you’ve got to slow down or I’m going to lose my damn mind.”

“Years of pining,” replies Kakashi between kisses, fingers splayed against Obito’s ribcage, “and you want me to slow down?”

“ _Yes_ , idiot, because —“ Obito’s brain catches up to the last sentence and he blinks. “Wait. Years?”

Kakashi goes still.

Obito pulls away, just a little, disbelieving. “You can’t be serious.”

But the look in Kakashi’s eyes is, in fact, serious, and a little sad.

He disentangles himself from Obito carefully, looking away and rubbing the back of his neck. “I… after the war, when you survived. I started to realize some things I hadn’t before.” He sighs. “Some things I hadn’t been willing to admit to myself. Things like… maybe you meant more to me than I’d thought.”

“Eight — no, nine years ago.” Obito shakes his head a little, trying to understand. “You’ve felt like this for _nine years_ , and never said anything?”

Kakashi spreads his hands helplessly. “What was I supposed to say? ‘Oh, hey, Obito, by the way, now that we’ve got that whole world-destroying thing behind us —‘“

“Okay, when you put it like that, it sounds stupid.” Obito crosses his arms. “But that was nine years ago.”

“So, what, I was supposed to write you a letter confessing my feelings? When I didn’t know if you were ever coming back?” Kakashi’s voice rises. “Or, when you _did_ come back, and had to come to terms with the fact that most of the village wasn’t thrilled with the idea, I was supposed to tell you then? When I had basically made myself the only person you could turn to for support?” 

Obito opens his mouth and closes it again. He hates to admit it, but Kakashi has a point.

“Besides,” Kakashi adds, “couldn’t I ask you the same thing?”

“What — why I didn’t tell you sooner?” Obito laughs. “Because ‘sooner’ would have been four days ago. Kind of hard to tell you something I didn’t know myself.”

Kakashi’s brow furrows. “What?”

“It explains everything, you know. Everything I didn’t want to tell you earlier.” Obito leans against the railing. “You were right about the timing of the seals’ disappearance not making sense — _if_ they were morality-based, like you thought. But what if it was something else?” Obito gestures between the two of them. “What if it was this?”

He watches Kakashi’s eyes widen.

“And then,” Obito continues, because he might as well just get it all out, “when you touched my hand, the other day — Ino _saw_. And now here we are.”

There is a long silence. Finally Kakashi exhales, and runs a hand through his hair.

“Wow,” he says heavily. “Here we are.”

“It’s pretty fucked up,” Obito agrees. Kakashi’s answering smile is wry.

“Our whole lives have been pretty fucked up, don’t you think?” He meets Obito’s gaze with eyes gone unexpectedly soft. “What’s one more thing?”

_What’s one more thing?_

Obito has to fight to get words past the lump in his throat. “You say that like it’s nothing, you know that? Like every single person in a position of power in Konoha isn’t actively losing their shit as we speak.”

“Let them,” says Kakashi. “We’ll deal with it when we have to.”

“As though ‘when we have to’ isn’t ‘right the fuck now.’”

“It’s late,” Kakashi protests. “And it’s a nice night. And we have better things to do.”

Obito thinks he knows where this is going. “Better things.”

Kakashi, gods help him, waggles his eyebrows.

“It’s a miracle you’re still alive, honestly,” says Obito through his teeth as he steps forward, getting a fistful of Kakashi’s shirt collar and _pulling,_ “because the amount of self-restraint required to put up with you is staggering.”

“Don’t pretend you’re not into it,” Kakashi replies, eyes crinkling, hands already settled on Obito’s hips again like — like they belong there or something. And, well, there’s no good response to that, is there? 

“Bastard,” Obito says, and tugs him down into a kiss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the rating's going up next chapter. you've been warned.


	13. scars

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> as promised, the rating went up. Only a little tiny bit.

The moon is beautiful tonight, Kakashi thinks, watching its light cast dappled shadows across the living room floor, across the low table and the wooden sculpture, across Obito’s face tucked against his shoulder, his closed eyes and his slow even breaths.

Kakashi lets himself look. He lets himself run fingers softly, wonderingly, through Obito’s hair. 

That he is allowed this, now, after everything, feels like nothing short of a miracle. And — the two of them might be martyrs of their own making, but Kakashi isn’t above gratitude. Not yet.  


Obito stirs under his touch, murmurs something sleepily into his shoulder, and Kakashi takes his thoughts about what’s allowed and what isn’t and tucks them aside for tomorrow. 

Nine years is a long, long time.

“Obito,” he says, softly, hesitating just a little.

“Hm?” Obito replies, boneless and content, and Kakashi is loathe to take that away from him, but — but. Gods help him, but it’s been nine years of waiting, and Kakashi _wants._

“Come to bed,” he says. It’s a question more than it is anything, because even after tonight, even after Obito tugged his mask down and kissed him like he would die if he didn’t, he needs to be sure.

Against his side Obito goes still as stone. Kakashi’s heart is in his throat; he is already thinking of apologies, and then Obito sits up and turns toward him and the look in his eyes is enough to burn every thought out of Kakashi’s head.

His voice is rough when he replies, sending shivers down Kakashi’s spine. “Lead the way.”

It’s almost more than Kakashi can take; almost enough for him to say, _forget the bed, we have a couch._ But — nine years. Kakashi’s determined to make it count.

He stands and makes his way down the darkened hallway and into his room, Obito trailing close behind, footfalls soft on the wooden floor. Briefly he considers turning on a lamp, but silver moonlight is pouring through the window and slanting across the bed and he thinks, _good enough,_ and it’s all he has time to think because there’s a hand on his shoulder, turning him roughly around, and then Obito is kissing him.

Obito is kissing him. Obito’s mouth is hot and slick and open against his; Obito’s hands are everywhere, his body pressed flush against Kakashi’s own without an inch of space to spare; when he gets a hand into Obito’s hair, making him groan, Kakashi _feels_ the noise as much as he hears it. It’s dizzying, intoxicating. Kakashi never wants it to stop.

He knows, though, better than most, the kind of baggage people like them carry, and so he pulls back just enough to be able to form words. Obito chases his mouth, closing the distance, and the feeling is so delicious that Kakashi nearly lets himself get distracted. Nearly.

“We should talk,” he manages to get out against Obito’s lips. 

Obito snorts derisively, rolling his hips against Kakashi’s, _oh._ Clearly he has other ideas. But this is important; he tries again. “I’m serious.”

He gets just enough breathing room to be on the receiving end of a truly incredulous glare. “Kakashi,” says Obito flatly. “What could there possibly be to talk about.” 

In lieu of words, Kakashi reaches up and runs his fingers lightly across the scars etched deep into the left side of Obito’s face, and feels him freeze in shock. “That,” he says. “And other things.”

He doesn’t know the full extent of what Obito went through between the day he was lost under the rocks and the day Naruto shattered his mask, and he probably never will, but he has a pretty good idea. The wide-eyed blankness of Obito’s current expression confirms his suspicions; he’ll have to be careful about this.

He’s familiar enough with Obito’s defense mechanisms that he expects a scowl and a cutting remark, so he’s thrown off guard when Obito blinks, seems to come back to himself a little, and then meets his gaze steadily. “Why?” Obito asks.

How can he put this? 

“I don’t want to hurt you,” he settles on, finally. “I’m done hurting you.”

Obito swallows. Shifts his weight.

“I love you,” Kakashi continues, pushing past the way his voice cracks on the second word. “I want to make you feel good. I want to touch you, and I want you to _enjoy_ it.” He holds Obito’s eyes. “Not… tolerate it, or get through it. Enjoy it.”

He runs his hands down Obito’s ribcage, carefully, and feels him inhale unsteadily. “And I need you to tell me how to do that.” He pauses, then adds, “Please.”

Obito stares at him, looking caught, for a few more seconds, then blows out a noisy breath, eyes falling shut. “Gods, Kakashi,” he says, quietly. “You really know how to get in there and twist, don’t you?” He laughs just a little. “Always have.”

That hits close to home, but Kakashi isn’t about to show it. He waits.

Eyes still closed, Obito says, “I don’t want to feel — pinned down, or restrained.” He breathes in slowly, lets it out. “And… you can touch the scars, but be gentle. None of it ever really healed the way it was supposed to.” He opens his eyes again, and Kakashi doesn’t have words for his expression, except that it burns; his smile is all teeth. “Madara better hope I live to a ripe old age, because after I die I’m going to kick his ass.”

Kakashi has to push down the old, simmering anger he feels on Obito’s behalf, has to lock it away for another time. His fingers tighten a little on Obito’s sides. “Anything else?”

Obito’s grin is wry now, as well as sharp. “Trust me, if you do anything I don’t like, you’ll know about it.”

Like so many things about their relationship, it’s not perfect, but it’s good enough. “Okay.” Kakashi nods to himself a few times. “Okay.” 

He takes a breath and steps deliberately back into Obito’s space, closing the gap that’s grown between them, wrapping his arms around Obito’s waist. When he gets a thigh between his legs, Obito bites his lip, eyes going half-lidded and hungry. He’s hard against Kakashi’s hip, the skin of his back is warm where Kakashi’s hands have rucked up his shirt, and Kakashi — well, Kakashi has had enough of serious conversations for tonight.

“Now then,” he says, walking backwards and pulling Obito with him until the backs of his knees hit the edge of the bed, “where were we?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh, wow, y'all. I can't believe it's been over eight months. I could regale you with excuses and justifications for days, but I doubt you're interested in hearing them. Just trust me when I say I always swore I'd never become one of Those Fic Writers that only updated once in a blue moon, and now here I am, feeling ridiculous. I apologize if I've kept any of you on tenterhooks for the majority of 2018. 
> 
> To everyone who's left kudos, comments, and bookmarks: you light up my world more than you'll ever know. Commenters: I'll reply to you individually at some point, I promise. I really, really will. Part of what drove me to finish this chapter was productive procrastination as I study for the biggest exam of my life so far, so I really should get back to that before I do anything else. But I see you, and I cherish you, so much.
> 
> (upon rereading: WOW, this chapter is way shorter, and a little bit angstier, than I ever intended it to be. But you know what they say: Sometimes It Be Like That.)
> 
> ((the next chapter will be softer if that's any consolation))


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